Catholic author and journalist Michael H. Brown, editor of SpiritDaily.com, has a new book out: Future Events: A Prophecy of Coming Times. Click here to order a paperback copy. Below is an excerpt, provided to me by Brown, that focuses on the Third Secret of Fátima. Brown has been kind enough to link to a number of my columns over the years.

Whether Catholic or Protestant, denominational or non-denominational, even believer or not, the prophecies, the expectations, of major events are at a fever pitch and have been accompanied by natural disasters that tick upward: earthquakes, floods, “bomb” cyclones, wildfires, volcanoes, warfare, and a pandemic unlike any seen since 1918. Tellingly, that plague occurred just after famous secrets were given at that hallowed place in Portugal called Fátima where Mary appeared to the three children and gave them secrets, one of which has yet to unfold….

Most electrifying in Sister Lucia's description of the famous Fatima Third Secret were those words: “After the two parts which I have already explained, at the left of Our Lady and a little above, we saw an Angel with a flaming sword in his left hand; flashing, it gave out flames that looked as though they would set the world on fire.”

Initially, the interpretation of it seemed obvious: The “sword” was a warhead, the “fire” a nuclear exchange. After all, this was an apparition that focused largely on armed conflict, Communism, and Russia – which was soon to amass the world’s greatest stockpile of atomic weapons (albeit not as sophisticated and efficient, some might argue, as those in the nearly equally voluminous American stockpile). The secrets had warned of Russia spreading its errors and causing the “annihilation of nations.” That had been in the first two parts of the Fátima prophecy, and did not a nuclear explosion ignite torrents of incredible fire (and “clouds”), with the potential, in all-out conflict, to literally destroy entire countries? Could not Russia wipe out all of Britain and hardly notice any warheads missing from its stockpile?

Beyond that were the coincidences. Right after John Paul II, attempting to fulfill the Fátima request to consecrate Russia, had dedicated the entire world to her Immaculate Heart (with allusions to, but not specific mention of, Russia), an explosion had destroyed two-thirds of missiles stockpiled for the Northern Fleet at the Soviets’ Severomorsk Naval Base. The blast killed hundreds of technicians and took out workshops needed to maintain the missiles. Western military experts called it the worst Soviet naval disaster since the Second World War, and it was followed, was that “coincidence,” in December of the same year, by the sudden, mysterious death of a belligerent Soviet defense minister and soon the rise of a pacifist named Mikhail Gorbachev who hinted at an affinity for Christianity and had been a prime catalyst for the collapse of Communism: first in Eastern Europe (starting with the Pope’s homeland of Poland) and then Soviet republics themselves, including Ukraine and most stunningly, Russia itself.

No one ever thought they’d live to see this. No expert on “Meet the Press” dared such far-fetched notions. No foreign minister, no analyst at U.S. State Department, no history prof – not at Harvard, Princeton, not at Oxford – had projected the fall of Communism. Truly a bolt from beyond, it could only have been orchestrated by God, Who chose to do so through an emissary named Mary.

Later, in 1993, Sister Lucia would tell visiting Filipino Cardinal Ricardo Vidal (and a retinue of eight others) that not only had the Consecration brought down Communism, but that “the Consecration of 1984 prevented an atomic war that would have occurred in 1985.”

That was dramatic: a direct quote from Lucia, recorded by a translator, that seemed to confirm the secret’s image: Our Lady halting the “flaming” angelic sword from unleashing a nuclear horror.

But now, in 1944 – according to a book by her fellow nuns – "A Pathway Under the Gaze of Mary" – Lucia had been given an "enlightenment" about the secret, and it was obvious more was in store for the mankind.

Without massive repentance, indicated the elucidation, planet earth would find itself with an apocalypse, unimagined upheaval, and it seemed the “Pope of the Secret,” John Paul II, knew about it in 1980, when, asked outside the Cathedral of Fulda in Germany about the as yet unreleased Third Secret, he had said, “We must be prepared to undergo great trials in the not-too-distant future; trials that will require us to be ready to give up even our lives, and a total gift of self to Christ and for Christ. Through your prayers and mine, it is possible to alleviate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it."

Brown has also covered the murder of Father Alfred Kunz, a case I’ve been following and covering for years. (I was interviewed for a 2022 HLN/CNN show about the case.)

Brown wrote in 2019 (not included in his aforementioned book, but on his website):

Who, or what, killed Father Alfred Kunz?

The question is asked about this Midwestern priest who was found dead on March 4, 1998 (we didn’t know that specific date when this article was scheduled for today). Is it time for the truth to come to the surface?

It is still an unsolved mystery, described as possibly the most time-consuming one in the history of Dane County, Wisconsin. The priest — an expert on canon law and a traditionalist type who celebrated Mass in both English and Latin — was found brutally slain, his throat slashed, the signs of a great struggle, in a hallway at St. Michael School just over a dozen miles from Madison.

Was it a crime of passion? A robbery? A group of satanists? A conspiracy of pedophile priests (Father Kunz was a sharp critic of sexual abusers in Illinois as well as in his own diocese)? Over the years, there have been multiple suspects, but police are not even sure the killer is any longer alive.

Certainly, there was a dark force behind it — starting with the fact that it occurred where it did — a school dedicated to the Archangel Michael (and right near a statue of the saint) — and that Father Kunz was close to the famous Catholic writer-exorcist Malachi Martin and had performed at least a couple exorcisms (it was reported) himself.

Martin claimed it was a cabal of ‘Luciferians.’

A mutilated calf — perhaps an animal sacrifice — was found a few miles away from his church a week before the murder.

But robbery or an interrupted theft more likely spurred the murder, for Father Kunz was known to leave bags of collection money undeposited for weeks at a time as he tended to an extraordinarily busy (and charity-oriented) schedule….

Father Kunz reportedly had been investigating what was known as the ‘Boys Club,’ what [Catholic World Report] called a ‘loosely organized group of priests and laity who cultivated sexual relationships with vulnerable boys and shared these boys with each other.’ It allegedly was centered in Chicago’s Bridgeport neighborhood.’ Texas attorney Sheila Parkhill, who also investigated the Boys Club, said its members are guilty of ritualistic and satanic abuse of children, as well as murder, credit card theft, and fraud,’ said the report.

© Matt C. Abbott